I found this analogy, which should be called a parable that explains closely why God sent His Son, Jesus, to earth. I have used it a couple of times in my sermons. It is my prayer that this explains to someone who is lost, Why? Legend has it there was a royal king who loved a humble maiden. She had no royal pedigree whatsoever. No education, no standing in the court. She dressed in rags. She lived in a hovel. She led the ragged life of a peasant. But for reason nobody could quite figure out, the king fell in love with this girl the way that kings sometimes do. Why he should love her is beyond explaining, but love her, he did, and he could not stop loving her. One day there awoke in the heart of the king an anxious thought. How in the world was he going to reveal his love to this girl? I mean, how could he bridge the chasm that separated the two of them? His advisers, of course, would tell him all you gotta do is command her to come and be your queen and its done! For he was a man of immense power and every statesman feared his wrath, every foreign power trembled before him, and every courier groveled in the darkness at the kings voice. This poor peasant girl would have no power to resist. She would have to become the queen! But power, even unlimited power, cannot command love, and the king could force her body to be present in his palace, but he could not force love for him to be present in her heart. He might be able to gain her obedience this way, but coerced submission is not what he wanted. He longed for intimacy of heart and oneness of spirit, and all the power of the world cannot unlock the door to the human heart. It must be opened from within. So, once again, he met with his advisers and they suggested the king try to bridge the chasm between them by elevating her to his position. He could shower her with gifts, dress her in purple and silk, and have her crowned the queen. But if he brought her to his palace, if he radiated the sum of his magnificence over her, if she saw all the wealth, power, and pomp of his greatness, she would be overwhelmed. How could he ever know if she loved him for himself or for all that he had given her? And how could she know that he loved her and would love her still even if she had remained only a humble peasant? Would she be able to summon confidence enough, never to remember only what the king wished to forget; that he was the king and she had been a humble maiden? Every alternative he came up with turned into nothing. There was only one way. So, one day the king arose, took off his crown, relinquished his scepter, laid aside his royal robes, took upon himself the life of a peasant. He dressed in rags and scratched out a living in the dirt and groveled for food and dwelt in a hovel. He did not just take on the outward appearance of a servant. He became a servant. It was his actual life, his actual nature, his actual burden. He became as ragged as the one he loved so that she could be his forever. It was the only way. His raggedness became the very signature of his presence. And I dont have to explain this story to anyone, because this is exactly what God did for us. One day in heaven, He asked Himself, How shall I communicate my love to the people on the earth? And He said, I know what I will do. I will become one of them. And He took off His crown and His royal robes, and He walked out of the throne room of Glory and came to this earth to be born as a baby, and live as one of us so that He could say by His very presence, I love you. I love you so much that I dont want you to miss the message that can only be communicated only if I become as you are. In my humanity, I want to become as you are, so that in your humanity, you can become as I am. Then He went to the cross to pay the penalty for our sins. How do we know that God loves us? We know that God loves us because of the incarnation. We know that God loves us because He did not withhold anything from us. He looked around Heaven for the greatest gift He could give us to determine for us His love, and that great gift was His own Son, the Lord, Jesus Christ. He dispatched Him from Heaven to earth so that we might have a visible, tangible evidence of His love for us. God loves you. He always has, and He always will. And His love has been demonstrated as John 3:16 tells us, For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
Posted on: Tue, 27 Jan 2015 09:55:26 +0000